Chapter 24 #2
“Seriously? I’m so scary.” Ellie crossed her arms in front of her chest and scowled, but she quickly broke into a wide grin. “Okay. You’re right. I’ll send Juniper after her.”
“Now, that I can see. And it would be nice for her wrath to be focused on someone else.”
“It will be soon, don’t worry.”
“Speaking of which, I probably shouldn’t stay too much longer, huh?”
Ellie picked up her phone and laid it back down. “Juniper still hasn’t texted that she left, so we have at least a few more hours. Anything you want to do until then?”
Sierra snuggled in closer to Ellie. “Can we just lay here and forget the world for a little bit longer while it’s still possible?”
Ellie placed a kiss on Sierra’s forehead that caused her whole body to buzz. “I’d love to forget the world with you.”
***
Sierra put off leaving Ellie’s for so long, she almost thought she was going to have to sneak out the window so Juniper didn’t catch her there. After about a million goodbye kisses, Sierra finally forced her feet to move and she left Ellie’s place (through the front door, luckily).
She had just crossed the street onto campus and was walking along the sidewalk when she saw Juniper’s car drive by. Phew. That was close.
Sierra took a deep breath once she was standing in front of her dorm and hesitated before going inside.
She had no idea if Teresa was back yet. She had no clue about anything involving Teresa since they hadn’t texted once over break and thankfully hadn’t run into each other in their hometown either.
When she heard her text tone go off, her nerves picked up, because she thought it might be Teresa checking in. When she looked at the phone, she was relieved to find it was actually Ellie. Six texts in a row came through from her, and Sierra smiled as she read through them.
I miss you already. Want to get dinner with me after practice tomorrow?
Maybe we should have lunch so I can see you sooner.
Actually, I owe you a dinner date.
I won’t ditch you this time. I promise.
Okay… final plan: I’ll wait until practice to see you, secretly pine for you the whole time, then pick you up at 7 for dinner.
Say you agree and I promise to stop attacking you with texts :)
Sierra hated that her mind immediately compared Ellie to Teresa, but every comparison showed her they were incomparable.
Even at their best, Teresa never acted this excited to spend time with Sierra.
Teresa always seemed happy when they were together, and she said all of the right things, but it wasn’t like this.
Sierra sent Ellie a text back, agreeing to go to dinner with her and letting her know that she missed her too.
The smile never left her face as she took the elevator up to her floor and walked down the hallway to her room.
She was still smiling down at her phone, rereading Ellie’s texts, as she walked into her room.
She was so distracted, she didn’t notice the other person present in her room.
“Um, hi,” Teresa said, sounding annoyed just from Sierra’s presence.
A pit formed in Sierra’s stomach when she looked up and saw Teresa staring at her.
The person standing in front of her was a far cry from the girl Sierra used to know.
Of course, she hadn’t been that girl for a very long time, but she was even more of a stranger to Sierra now that she didn’t cause that same flutter in her stomach that she used to.
This definitely wasn’t a stranger she wanted to be having a conversation with right now, but she didn’t really have a choice with Teresa standing right in front of her waiting for her to answer. “Hey, how was your break?”
“It was fine.” Teresa puckered her lips and narrowed her eyes. “There’s something different about you.”
Sierra shrugged. “I’m just happy, I guess.” There was no guessing about it, but she wasn’t going to give Teresa more details than that.
“What are you so happy about?” The tone of Teresa’s voice made it sound like she was mad at Sierra for being happy.
“It was a good break.”
“Hmm.” Teresa sat down on her bed and put on her headphones, apparently done with their conversation.
Sierra hadn’t even been back in their room for five minutes, and she already wanted to crawl out of her own skin.
After putting away her clothes and the few other things she had taken home for break, she lay down in her own bed and put on her headphones as well.
She wanted to text Ellie more, but didn’t want to interrupt her time with Juniper, so she went through the pictures they had taken together this weekend instead.
Sierra didn’t know how much time had passed before she heard Teresa’s feet hit the floor.
She looked over to find Teresa already staring at her.
Teresa pointed at the door. “I’m going to go pick up some dinner at the dining hall.
I’m going to assume you don’t want to come since you don’t even want to be my roommate anymore. ”
There was so much Sierra wanted to say in response to that.
She had tried to be Teresa’s friend. She had done everything in her power to keep things from getting awkward between them, but Teresa had pushed her to her breaking point.
Also, wasn’t it Teresa who decided they needed to be “cordial roommates” only, which led to things being so uncomfortable in their room that Sierra felt she had no other choice but to leave?
She could have pointed out all of that, but instead, she told Teresa she wasn’t hungry.
“I hope you enjoy your dinner though,” she added at the end to try her best to make things a little less awkward between them.
“Yeah, thanks.” Teresa scoffed. “Also, you might want to find somewhere to go later. I’ll probably have a guy over.
” The tone of her voice made it sound like she was only saying it to try to hurt Sierra, but Sierra didn’t want to take any chances, so she decided she would go to the library for a little bit when it was around the time Teresa would be getting back.
She didn’t have any work to do at the library, but it was better than being stuck in her dorm room with the girl who hated her, whether she had a boy with her or not.
*
After spending a few hours at the library, scrolling endlessly on her phone and preparing her folders and notebooks for the upcoming semester, Sierra headed back to her dorm.
When she walked in, she found Teresa snuggled in bed next to some guy Sierra had never seen before.
A feeling of jealousy overtook her as she looked over at them, but it had nothing to do with the fact that Teresa was close to someone else and everything to do with the fact that she missed Ellie and wanted to be doing that with her.
“Oh, I’m sorry,” the guy said as he sat up slightly. “Teresa didn’t think you’d be back so soon. I can go if you two want to hang out or something.”
“She’s just my roommate,” Teresa said. “We don’t hang out. ”
Her words didn’t hurt as much as they pissed Sierra off. How dare she act like Sierra was no one? That would be rude even if they really had always been just roommates.
The guy looked between the two of them, his whole body strained as if he could feel the tension in the room. Eventually, his eyes stopped on Sierra. “If you want to go to sleep, you can tell me. It’s really no big deal.”
“It actually is a big deal. The movie has barely started,” Teresa said, her voice sounding more and more annoyed every time she spoke.
“I was actually just coming to grab my shower tote and a change of clothes. I have things to do, so I won’t be back for at least another two hours.”
Sierra quickly grabbed her things, then rushed out of the room and into the bathroom. She wasn’t planning on showering, but she might as well since she wasn’t welcome in her own room .
After spending much longer than necessary in the shower, Sierra brushed her teeth and got dressed. When she checked her phone, she realized there was no way the movie was over yet, plus she didn’t really want to be in there anyway.
Without overthinking it, she clicked on Ellie’s name to call her. She wasn’t even sure if the phone rang once when Ellie picked up.
“Hey, you! How are you?”
“I’m fine,” Sierra said, trying to make it sound as believable as possible.
“Okay. Cool. Here’s what I’m going to do. I’m going to ask you that question one more time and this time, I want you to be honest with me. Hey, you! How are you?”
For the first time since moving back into her dorm room, a sincere smile spread across Sierra’s face. “I’d be better if my ex wasn’t such a bitch.”
“Uh-oh. What happened?”
Sierra explained everything that had happened since she left Ellie’s apartment, down to the fact that Teresa was still in their dorm room, that Sierra apparently wasn’t welcome in, watching a movie with some random guy, who honestly seemed way too nice for her.
Ellie let out a low whistle. “That’s really rough. I’m so sorry. Do you want me to pick you up, and we can go for a drive somewhere?”
“I can’t make you do that. It’s late. I’m sure you already started getting ready for bed.
” One of the things Sierra had learned about Ellie was that she was very serious about getting at least eight hours of sleep.
She knew Ellie had an 8 a.m. class, so she was sure she had to have started her nighttime routine by now.
“It’s seriously no big deal. I don’t want you to be by yourself.”
It was quiet, but Sierra caught a small yawn coming from Ellie’s side of the phone. Ellie had clearly tried to cover it up, so Sierra didn’t realize how tired she was.
“Don’t worry about it. I mean it. The movie is going to be over soon, and then I’m going right to bed.” She let out an exaggerated yawn to make her point to Ellie.
“Only if you’re sure.” Ellie lowered her voice to a whisper. “All I’ve been able to think about all day is how good it feels to kiss you. My bed feels so empty without you tonight.”
Sierra’s heart felt empty without Ellie, but she wasn’t going to admit that out loud. Hell, she didn’t even like admitting it to herself. “I’m sure. I miss you too, Ellie. I miss you so much.”
She almost thought she might start to cry as she said the words, which was pathetic as it hadn’t been long since they last saw each other.
She knew it went beyond that, though. She missed the special little world they had created where nothing could hurt Sierra.
Just thinking about going back to her room and dealing with Teresa made her heart hurt.
“Do you want to stay up and talk more?”
“No. I’m okay. Thanks for talking to me, though. It helped a lot.”
“Goodnight, Sierra. I’ll see you tomorrow at practice and then again for our date. ”
“See you tomorrow, Ellie.”
As soon as Ellie hung up, Sierra felt the loss. She would have talked to Ellie all night if she could have. When her phone vibrated, she expected a text from Ellie, but unfortunately, it was Teresa.
That was so awkward. There’s no way I’m going to see that guy again. Did you purposely ruin things for me because you’re jealous? That’s so unfair. You need to get over me.
Sierra plopped down onto the common room couch and made herself comfortable. She might as well. Going back to her room seemed like a much more uncomfortable option than this brick couch right now. With the safety of space between them, Sierra typed out a text she never thought she would send.
I am over you.
She hit send and shut her eyes.